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Way Back Machine

Stories about the way things were on the Delmarva Peninsula–the Eastern Shore of Maryland, the Eastern Shore of Virginia, and Delaware.

MiscellanyQuote of the DayWay Back Machine

Life & Times in Old-Fashioned Country Stores, 1918 (with lots of photos!)

I was looking up something else in the February 23, 1918 edition of the Denton (Md.) Journal when I got distracted by the wonderful little essay below. It’s about the many roles that general stores and their shopkeepers filled in the communities of Delmarva around that time. There was no headline on the piece. Nor was there a byline. Old newspapers can be weird like…
March 1, 2021
CharactersWay Back Machine

The St. Michaels Seafood Packing Plant that Helped Blue Crabs Rise To a Whole New Level in the Early 1900s

The next time you’re at the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum in St. Michaels, Md., take a few moments to remember that you’re walking in the entrepreneurial footsteps of William H.T. Coulbourne and Frederick Jewett. It’ll be easy—the gift shop is where the Coulbourne family lived for many years, and the Coulbourne & Jewett seafood-packing plant stood at the heart of the museum’s campus, on Navy…
February 19, 2021
Quote of the DayWay Back Machine

Celebrating the End of Slavery in a Black Church, 1864: ‘You belong to nobody but de Lord now.”

The way slaves in Maryland gained their freedom was a little bit different. The Emancipation Proclamation issued by Abraham Lincoln in 1863 applied only in Confederate states, not in the three Union states where slavery remained legal, even while the Civil War raged. It was up to Marylanders to end slavery on their own. In October 1864--22 months after Lincoln's proclamation--the state's voters approved a…
February 4, 2021
Quote of the DayWay Back Machine

“Now I’m Almost Home!” The Death and Funeral of Harriet Tubman, 1913

When her time came, Harriet Tubman was ready. Among the last recorded words of wisdom that we received from the Eastern-Shore-born heroine of the Underground Railroad comes to us by way of suffragette and civil rights activist Mary Burnett Talbert, who made a pilgrimage to upstate New York upon hearing that Harriet's health was failing. It was February of 1913. Harriet had been living in…
January 31, 2021
CharactersDestinationsWay Back Machine

Distaff Beauty: The Women Lighthouse Keepers of Turkey Point

This is a free excerpt from Eastern Shore Road Trips 2: 26 MORE One-Day Adventures on Delmarva. It comes from a chapter that includes stops in the towns of Elkton, North East, and Charlestown, as well as a visit to a covered bridge the remains of an old gristmill. The most beautiful of those overlooks lies at the end of a 12-or-so-mile drive down Turkey…
December 31, 2020
DestinationsWay Back Machine

On the Rocks at Cape Henlopen: Breaking New Ground Since the 1800s

This is a free excerpt from the revised 2nd edition of Eastern Shore Road Trips #1: 27 One-Day Adventures on Delmarva. Every chapter in that book has an afernote like this, telling a story from days gone by. This one appears in the road trip devoted to Rehoboth Beach. Thanks for reading! Sometimes the best stories a pretty scene has to tell are actually hiding…
December 31, 2020
Way Back Machine

A Wild, Icy Ride on Sharps Island Light

Many of you have climbed up into the cottage of a screwpile lighthouse. Perhaps in St. Michaels, Md. at the Maritime Museum. Or in Cambridge, Md. on the waterfront. Perhaps some of you been in one of those beacons on a day so cold and windy you could feel the whole cottage shaking. OK, now imagine three things: (1) The cottage stands out in the…
December 30, 2020